Amerciaments, or fines for crimes and trespasses, were another
considerable branch of the royal revenue [o]. Most crimes were atoned
for by money; the fines imposed were not limited by any rule or
statute; and frequently occasioned the total ruin of the person, even
for the slightest trespasses. The forest-laws, particularly, were a
great source of oppression. The king possessed sixty-eight forests,
thirteen chases, and seven hundred and eighty-one parks, in different
parts of England [p]; and considering the extreme passion of the
English and Normans for hunting, these were so many snares laid for
the people, by which they were allured into trespasses, and brought
within the reach of arbitrary and rigorous laws, which the king had
thought proper to enact by his own authority.
[FN [o] Madox, chap. 14. [p] Spellm. Gloss. in verbo FORESTA.]

But the most barefaced acts of tyranny and oppression were practised
against the Jews, who were entirely out of the protection of law, were
extremely odious from the bigotry of the people, and were abandoned to
the immeasurable rapacity of the king and his ministers. Besides many
other indignities to which they were continually exposed, it appears
that they were once all thrown into prison, and the sum of sixty-six
thousand marks exacted for their liberty [q]: at another time, Isaac
the Jew paid alone five thousand one hundred marks [r]; Brun, three
thousand marks [s]; Jurnet, two thousand; Bennet, five hundred: at
another, Licorica, widow of David, the Jew of Oxford, was required to
pay six thousand marks; and she was delivered over to six of the
richest and discreetest Jews in England, who were to answer for the
sum [t]. Henry III. borrowed five thousand marks from the Earl of
Cornwall; and for his repayment, consigned over to him all the Jews in
England [u]. The revenue arising from exactions upon this nation was
so considerable, that there was a particular court of exchequer set
apart for managing it [w].
[FN [q] Madox's Hist. of the Exch. p. 151. This happened in the reign
of King John. [r] Id. p. 151. [s] Id. p. 153. [t] Id. p. 168. [u]
Id. p. 156. [w] Id. chap. 7.]

[MN Commerce.]
We may judge concerning the low state of commerce among the English,
when the Jews, notwithstanding these oppressions, could still find
their account in trading among them, and lending them money. And as
the improvements of agriculture were also much checked by the immense
possess